Post by RealPitBull on Jan 10, 2008 10:24:35 GMT -5
Dying pit bulls in trash another sign of Westchester dogfighting
By JIM FITZGERALD | Associated Press Writer
5:38 PM EST, January 7, 2008
www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--discardeddogs0107jan07,0,3372486.story
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. - Maybe the dogs had lost a bout before a frenzied crowd in an abandoned basement. Maybe they had been used as bait to quicken the bloodlust in other dogs. But, dead or alive, the two shredded pit bulls were no longer of any use.
So the crippled, bloodied, starving terriers were thrown into a trash bin at a gas station late Saturday or early Sunday, left to die in layers of refuse, police in Yonkers said. By the time they were found in midmorning, one was dead and one was barely stirring.
Both dogs had puncture wounds and had lost a lot of blood. Unable to move, they had been exposed to the winter night.
The dead dog had bite marks around its head and may have been clamped in another dog's jaws and shaken into a concussion, said Ken Ross, police chief for the Westchester County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The survivor had "that vacant look you see on a dog that has been through everything."
The bloody discovery by the gas station's workers was the latest of several recent signs of dogfighting in the urban areas of lower Westchester, just north of New York City. In October, six scarred dogs were found in a Yonkers garage. In August, five Rottweilers and a pit bull were rescued in Mount Vernon, not long after an injured pit bull was found lying in its own blood in the street.
Around the same time, 63 flea-infested kittens, stuffed into three boxes, were found on the doorstep of a Mount Vernon animal shelter, likely saved from use as bait by someone who had a change of heart.
But experts say there's nothing unique about Westchester when it comes to dogfighting.
"It's everywhere," said Martin Mersereau, spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals in Norfolk, Va. "It's urban, it's rural, it's suburban. As long as there are cowards and there are pit bulls available to them there is going to be a dogfight."
He said Yonkers is no stranger to dogfighting and authorities there "are pretty hard on it, and we have no doubt the cowards behind this will be punished if they're ever found." In New York, fighting dogs is a felony, penalized by four years in prison and a $25,000 fine.
Ross said he thinks the level of dogfighting in Westchester hasn't changed much but people are more aware of it now because of publicity from the case of Michael Vick, the pro football star who was sentenced to 23 months in prison for training pit bulls for fighting.
"The fact that humans continue to do this after Michael Vick came out and all that became public is also very disturbing," Ross said.
He said he sees a link between dogfighting and gang activity and most local dogfighting is not on the scale of the "$10,000 betting, tournament thing."
"Sometimes it's just the status thing with gangs, and gangs will battle each other's dogs or two guys meet in somebody's basement to see whose dog is tougher," he said.
But the gang angle makes dogfighting even more of a blight because of "the drugs, the guns, all that comes with it," he said.
Mount Vernon police Commissioner David Chong said, "One thing we've seen is that anyone that would do this to a dog would do it to a human being."
Wherever dogfighting happens, the dogs always pay the price, Mersereau said.
"Sometimes they're doused with gasoline and set on fire," he said. "Sometimes they're tied to a cinder block and thrown in the river."
The dog that survived the weekend discard was responding Monday to antibiotics and hydration, Ross said, but he added its life span may depend on how mean-spirited its training was.
"You may save the dog," he said, "but then you may have to put down the dog."
By JIM FITZGERALD | Associated Press Writer
5:38 PM EST, January 7, 2008
www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--discardeddogs0107jan07,0,3372486.story
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. - Maybe the dogs had lost a bout before a frenzied crowd in an abandoned basement. Maybe they had been used as bait to quicken the bloodlust in other dogs. But, dead or alive, the two shredded pit bulls were no longer of any use.
So the crippled, bloodied, starving terriers were thrown into a trash bin at a gas station late Saturday or early Sunday, left to die in layers of refuse, police in Yonkers said. By the time they were found in midmorning, one was dead and one was barely stirring.
Both dogs had puncture wounds and had lost a lot of blood. Unable to move, they had been exposed to the winter night.
The dead dog had bite marks around its head and may have been clamped in another dog's jaws and shaken into a concussion, said Ken Ross, police chief for the Westchester County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The survivor had "that vacant look you see on a dog that has been through everything."
The bloody discovery by the gas station's workers was the latest of several recent signs of dogfighting in the urban areas of lower Westchester, just north of New York City. In October, six scarred dogs were found in a Yonkers garage. In August, five Rottweilers and a pit bull were rescued in Mount Vernon, not long after an injured pit bull was found lying in its own blood in the street.
Around the same time, 63 flea-infested kittens, stuffed into three boxes, were found on the doorstep of a Mount Vernon animal shelter, likely saved from use as bait by someone who had a change of heart.
But experts say there's nothing unique about Westchester when it comes to dogfighting.
"It's everywhere," said Martin Mersereau, spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals in Norfolk, Va. "It's urban, it's rural, it's suburban. As long as there are cowards and there are pit bulls available to them there is going to be a dogfight."
He said Yonkers is no stranger to dogfighting and authorities there "are pretty hard on it, and we have no doubt the cowards behind this will be punished if they're ever found." In New York, fighting dogs is a felony, penalized by four years in prison and a $25,000 fine.
Ross said he thinks the level of dogfighting in Westchester hasn't changed much but people are more aware of it now because of publicity from the case of Michael Vick, the pro football star who was sentenced to 23 months in prison for training pit bulls for fighting.
"The fact that humans continue to do this after Michael Vick came out and all that became public is also very disturbing," Ross said.
He said he sees a link between dogfighting and gang activity and most local dogfighting is not on the scale of the "$10,000 betting, tournament thing."
"Sometimes it's just the status thing with gangs, and gangs will battle each other's dogs or two guys meet in somebody's basement to see whose dog is tougher," he said.
But the gang angle makes dogfighting even more of a blight because of "the drugs, the guns, all that comes with it," he said.
Mount Vernon police Commissioner David Chong said, "One thing we've seen is that anyone that would do this to a dog would do it to a human being."
Wherever dogfighting happens, the dogs always pay the price, Mersereau said.
"Sometimes they're doused with gasoline and set on fire," he said. "Sometimes they're tied to a cinder block and thrown in the river."
The dog that survived the weekend discard was responding Monday to antibiotics and hydration, Ross said, but he added its life span may depend on how mean-spirited its training was.
"You may save the dog," he said, "but then you may have to put down the dog."
I look forward to learning much here